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Austrian Economics
A Category Archive (52 entries)
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November 3, 2008
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
Walter Block, arguing against Bryan, says that fractional reserve banking is fraudulent. There is some chance that when you make your deposit you will not get your money back, and instead someone else will have taken title to it. Therefore,... MORE
Austrian Economics
Bryan Caplan
Seriously. He shines in this response to Paul Craig Roberts on economic freedom indices. Highlight:Then there is this entirely inept, misleading, and even insulting equation of the "American taxpayer's situation today with that a 19th century American slave." Did you... MORE
Austrian Economics
Bryan Caplan
A little while back I had another email exchange with the tireless Walter Block. The subject: The moral legitimacy of fractional reserve banking. With my permission, Block has posted an edited version of our entire dialogue. The highlight: Block asks... MORE
October 22, 2008
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
In response to my post on the porn that is modern macro, readers naturally asked me for alternatives.... MORE
October 7, 2008
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
Mencius Moldbug sent an email asking me to comment on this post, and we have been corresponding back and forth. I should say that monetary theory gives me a headache.... MORE
August 25, 2008
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
We discuss his new book, The Price of Everything, and spontaneous order vs. central planning and design. Perhaps the most interesting part of the discussion concerns the issue of how to view political decisions. One tends to view them as... MORE
June 16, 2008
Austrian Economics
Bryan Caplan
Austrian economists often attack the mainstream for ignoring something they call "radical uncertainty," "sheer ignorance," or sometimes "Knightian uncertainty." A common Austrian slogan is that "Neoclassical economists study only cases where people know that they don't know; we study cases... MORE
June 6, 2008
Political Economy
Arnold Kling
Tyler Cowen writes, Insofar as I am conservative (debatable) I would rewrite the definition: A realization that we will do best by building on the strengths of the particular habits, mores and institutions of the United States (and other successful... MORE
May 11, 2008
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
This weekend, I attended a Liberty Fund seminar on Austrian economics vs. neoclassical economics. One point that was made was that the important thing is to have a productive research agenda. In the past Austrians might have been accused of... MORE
April 17, 2008
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
A commenter on an earlier post points me to Steven Horwitz: As excess supplies of money work their way through the market, they cause differential effects on prices. Some go up by a lot, some only by a little. These... MORE
April 3, 2008
Austrian Economics
Bryan Caplan
Here's a fair comment on my last post:Then you need to rewrite your article to say "Why I am a moderate Austrian" rather than why you are not an Austrian. Then you could get the substance right, even if you... MORE
February 6, 2008
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
He writes, The only thing one could do with those railroad tracks was carry trains. It would have been fantastic if the miles of excess railroad tracks could have been transformed into highways to service the new growth industry coming... MORE
December 20, 2007
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
A reader sent me a link to something Linus Torvalds wrote in 2001. You know what the most complex piece of engineering known to man in the whole solar system is? Guess what - it's not Linux, it's not Solaris,... MORE
June 11, 2007
Austrian Economics
Bryan Caplan
Here's a sweet rewrite of a typical Hayekian paragraph (Hat tip: Reg Hall): The successful application of science in our society has fostered the belief that the society itself can be similarly manipulated to our benefit. We need powerful arguments,... MORE
June 9, 2007
Austrian Economics
Bryan Caplan
I've returned from the Institute for Humane Studies' Liberty and Society seminar at Wake Forest University. Back in 1991, I was one of the students; now I'm faculty. Funny thing: The older I get, the more the writing style of... MORE
February 15, 2007
Austrian Economics
Bryan Caplan
It's a very ancient saying, But a true and honest thought, That if you become a teacher, By your pupils you'll be taught. --The King and I I've long nagged my students to enter essay contests. So I'm especially pleased... MORE
November 3, 2006
Austrian Economics
Bryan Caplan
Degrees of Freedom has an incisive critique of my Austrian brain drain allegation: If Austrian economics and mainstream economics were both equally persuasive, we should still expect to see far more libertarians who were persuaded by mainstream economics than libertarians... MORE
September 21, 2006
Austrian Economics
Bryan Caplan
I'm a critic of Austrian economics. I've published general critiques (see here, here, and here), and questioned their positions on economic calculation and the impossibility of socialism (see here and here). Today I just submitted a new piece to the... MORE
July 21, 2006
Austrian Economics
Eric Crampton
I ought to shill once for my home institution while guest blogging for Bryan. 2006 marks the Centenary of the Bachelor of Commerce at the University of Canterbury; our centennial celebrations take place in October. Other fun Canterbury facts: Karl... MORE
Austrian Economics
Eric Crampton
The socialist calculation debate of the 1920s and 1930s centred on whether a benevolent social planner could allocate resources in a planned economy to replicate the efficiencies of the market while remedying the ills of monopoly losses and profit-taking. Ludwig... MORE
March 23, 2006
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
Don Boudreaux explains, Whatever the topic -- war, economic growth, government regulation -- the only way to achieve genuine understanding of what's going on is to trace all actions back to the individuals who take them. The fact that individuals... MORE
March 17, 2006
Austrian Economics
Bryan Caplan
I recently mentioned that if you're feeling lonely, you should criticize Austrian economics, and you'll never again lack for human contact. Now Walter Block, Christopher Westley, and Alex Padilla have a hilarious 79-page piece of satire which turns Austrians' compulsive... MORE
March 15, 2006
Austrian Economics
Bryan Caplan
Well, not quite the world, but in the latest issue of Critical Review I debate Pete Boettke, Pete Leeson, David Gordon, Rodolfo Gonzalez, and Ed Stringham. The subject: My earlier CR article, "Is Socialism Really 'Impossible'?", which argued that the... MORE
February 22, 2006
Austrian Economics
Bryan Caplan
Back in the day, I was one of the research assistants for the Collected Works of Hayek. Frankly, the more I read, the less impressed I was. Among other things, Hayek spends a lot of time unconvincingly blaming socialism on... MORE
February 21, 2006
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
Dan Klein says Let me delineate a set of economists, different from but highly inclusive of the Austrian communities. First, consider only those seeing The Distinction between voluntary and coercive as analytically crucial; these economists, inevitably, are wise to the... MORE
January 26, 2006
Austrian Economics
Bryan Caplan
Are you puzzled by the appeal of the late Murray Rothbard? Try his newly available lectures on The History of Thought: From Marx to Hayek. All libertarian prejudice aside, I don't think any thoughtful economist could deny that Rothbard exudes... MORE
September 23, 2005
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
Pete Boettke highlights that Frederic Sautet asks, Why Aren't Austrians at the Discussion Table [Our thanks to Pete Boettke for correcting this attribution in a comment below.] • H1: We are simply delusional as to what Austrian economics (AE) can... MORE
September 12, 2005
Business Economics
Arnold Kling
In my latest essay, I write, While I have little faith in individual corporations, I have more faith in decentralized market processes. For example, although I have no admiration for any oil company in particular, I believe that we will... MORE
August 16, 2005
Public Goods
Arnold Kling
Subir Gokarn observes, I've often been asked for my opinion on what the country's sunrise sectors are. My response, at first tongue-in-cheek, but becoming more and more serious over the years, is that anybody who decides to compete against the... MORE
June 13, 2005
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
Nobody has tagged me (this reminds me of high school dances, somehow), but I'll have a go at it anyway: First, restricting to economic topics. Number of books I own: I would guess around two hundred. Last book I bought:... MORE
April 27, 2005
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
I just finished reading The Economy of Cities, a book written in 1969 by Jane Jacobs. An excerpt from her conclusion: The primary economic conflict, I think, is between people whose interests are with already well-established economic activities, and those... MORE
March 10, 2005
Austrian Economics
Bryan Caplan
How come interest rates are always positive? Austrian economists have a stock answer: it's because of time preference. All else equal, we prefer satisfaction sooner rather than later. If we did not have time preference, we would never consume anything,... MORE
March 2, 2005
Economic Education
Arnold Kling
In a wide-ranging essay, I question the dominance of math in advanced economics. The raising of the mathematical bar in graduate schools over the past several decades has driven many intelligent men and women (perhaps women especially) to pursue other... MORE
February 7, 2005
Economic Philosophy
Arnold Kling
Russ Roberts writes Over the next five or ten years, hundreds of millions of Chinese are expected to leave the Chinese countryside and move to the city. This extraordinary migration will require millions of adjustments to take place to make... MORE
February 2, 2005
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
Peter Gordon points to an interesting article by Meir Kohn in the Cato Journal The exchange paradigm has a very different theory of growth. Growth does not mean movement along an equilibrium path but rather the unfolding of a complex... MORE
January 6, 2005
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
An interesting collection of comments on the influence of Friedrich Hayek, from the latest issue of Reason. For example, cognitive psychologist Steven Pinker writes, Hayek was among the first to call attention to the emergence of large-scale order from individual... MORE
December 15, 2004
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
John Yunker writes, While Japan and Korea will retain their lead for some time, the US is poised to surpass Europe in network speeds, bandwidth consumption and, more important, network variety... Remember when the US was criticized by Europe for... MORE
September 29, 2004
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
Glenn Harlan Reynolds discusses the X-prize for private space travel using a rather Austrian viewpoint. But in all sorts of areas -- from space and jet aviation in the 1950s and 1960s, to computers in the 1970s and 1980s, to... MORE
September 18, 2004
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
Michael Van Winkle argues that the Internet's weblogs represent Hayek's concept of spontaneous order. We've all heard critics of the Internet claim that, because no one "controls" it, no one can control it from disseminating the most outrageous rumors and... MORE
September 10, 2004
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
Since the name of Paul Samuelson came up recently, I thought I would toss out a few random impressions of him. I only had Samuelson for one course, which I believe was in the Spring of 1977. It was part... MORE
July 26, 2004
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
What does government do? Austrian economists fear that government simply serves to protect incumbents. In a long, informative review of a book by Hans Herman-Hoppe, Andy Duncan writes, ask yourself if there are many large corporations in the US or... MORE
May 10, 2004
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
Francis Fukuyama reviews Bruce Caldwell's Hayek's Challenge, an intellectual biography of Friedrich Hayek. As Caldwell notes, Hayek initially thought the dividing line between possible and impossible positivism lay in the distinction between natural sciences and social sciences, but by the... MORE
January 20, 2004
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
A reader points to a fresh post on the Mises.org web site of a decade-old piece by Murray Rothbard arguing that the Federal government should not be allowed to create obligations for future taxpayers. One solution he proposes: I would... MORE
December 2, 2003
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
What leads to bad economic policy? Bryan Caplan writes, On the conventional view—widely accepted by economists, pundits, and the man in the street—the public demands policies in its own best interest, but the political system ignores their wishes. Bastiat and... MORE
November 11, 2003
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
After taking a quiz on Austrian Economics, I wrote about my agreements and disagreements with that school. Much of what I believe about economics is based on the concept of imperfect knowledge. Imperfect knowledge implies that as we gain knowledge,... MORE
October 27, 2003
Information Goods, Intellectual Property
Arnold Kling
I contrast Hayek and Stiglitz on the importance of imperfect information. Hayek would have the government tolerate messy competition. His point is that with the optimal outcome unknown, government resolution of issues shuts off the learning process that market competition... MORE
October 12, 2003
Growth: Causal Factors
Arnold Kling
Jonathan Rauch argues that the absence of a plan for post-war Iraq is a feature, not a bug. In truth, the planning mind-set is exactly wrong for Iraq. Anything might have happened after the war: a flood of refugees, a... MORE
July 2, 2003
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
Europe's proposed constitution is receiving scant attention in mainstream media, but many Web sites that I visit have discussed it. Most of the reviews are mixed, but Marian L. Tupy's opinion is unambiguous. They could have liberalized the rigid European... MORE
May 7, 2003
Energy, Environment, Resources
Arnold Kling
In the thread about capitalism as a benevolent system, Ward mused, Maybe there should be a school of Austrian Environmentalism that studies innovative ways to clean up or maintain the environment. To which Lynn Kiesling replied, one organization that does... MORE
May 2, 2003
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
Critics of capitalism see it as a cruel system that fosters injustice and exploitation. An alternative view is offered by many economists, particularly those of the Austrian School. George Reisman, for example, speaks of what he calls twelve insights into... MORE
April 19, 2003
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
I don't know how else to describe this article by Richard Florida (recommended with reservations by Stephen Karlson). In the later 20th century, the pace of creativity quickened while the profit from routinized production plummeted. A new version of capitalism... MORE
April 8, 2003
Austrian Economics
Arnold Kling
Sean Gabb explains how Austrian economics differs from Anglo-American economics. the standard economics textbooks provide an utterly unrealistic defense of the market. They begin with the claim that markets are efficient, and then define efficiency as it does not and... MORE
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